1110-0008_Supporting Statement A

SUPPORTING STATEMENT

1110-0008

Monthly Return of Arson Offenses Known to Law Enforcement

A. Justification.

1. Necessity of Information Collection

Under the authority of Title 28, U.S. Code, Section 534, Acquisition, Preservation, and Exchange of Identification Records; Appointment of Officials, June 11, 1930, the Congressional Directive of 1979, and the Anti-Arson Act 1982, the FBI was designated by the Attorney General to acquire, collect, classify, and preserve national data on arson as a Part I crime in the FBI Uniform Crime Reporting (UCR) Program.

Form 1-725, Monthly Return of Arson Offenses Known to Law Enforcement, provides for the national UCR Program the number of arson offenses reported monthly by law enforcement, the number of unfounded arson offenses, the total number of arson offenses cleared by arrest or exceptional means, and clearances for persons under the age of 18 regarding structural property, whether it be uninhabited, abandoned, or normally not in use; mobile property, as motor vehicles, trailers, airplanes, or boats; or other types of property, such as crops, timber, or signs. The form also provides an estimated value of property damage for each arson reported.

This information collection is a necessity in order for the FBI to maintain a database and serve as the national clearing house for the collection and dissemination of arson offenses and to ensure publication in the Preliminary Semiannual Report, Preliminary Annual Report, and Crime in the United States.

2. Needs and Uses

This form is needed in order for law enforcement agencies to report Part I arson offense data on hard copy. The national UCR Program is able to generate reliable information annually for use in law enforcement administration, operation, and management, nationwide. The information released is viewed as a guide or an indicator of police strengths, to establish manpower needs, in both number and makeup, and to provide effective enforcement and protection. Examples of other agencies' uses are:

a. The FBI serves as the national clearinghouse for storage of all arson statistics; therefore, these data are available upon request to any requester.

b. The Department of Justice, Bureau of Justice Assistance, utilizes the FBI UCR Program data in awarding local law enforcement formula grants.

c. Annual UCR data are provided to the Inter-University Consortium for Political and Social Research. This central repository serves as a single facility from which colleges/universities can obtain social science data.

3. Use of Information Technology

Currently, 85 percent of participating law enforcement agencies submit this form electronically. Electronic submissions downloaded from state UCR systems are received via Law Enforcement Online (LEO) e-mail at ucrstat@leo.gov, or received via magnetic media. For those state agencies unable to submit data electronically, data are received on hard copy. The FBI UCR Program made this form available as a pdf printable form on the Internet at www.fbi.gov/about-us/cjis/ucr/reporting-forms

Many states that participate in the FBI UCR program have a centralized repository serving as a state UCR Program. Several state UCR Programs have established electronic communications with their law enforcement agencies throughout their state. Agencies submit data to their state UCR Program and that state UCR Program subsequently forwards it to the FBI.

4. Efforts to Identify Duplication

This information collection was authorized in direct response to the enactment of Title 28, Section 534, U.S. Code, Acquisition, and Exchange of Identification Records; Appointment of Officials, June 11, 1930, a congressional directive in 1979, and the Anti-Arson Act of 1982.

Another known entity that collects fire data, whether it be considered arson or not, is the U.S. Fire Administration (USFA). USFA publishes “Fire in the United States (2003-2007)” and “Profile of Fire in the United States (2003-2007)”. These reports provide a statistical overview of fires in the United States and are designed to equip the fire service and others with information that motivates corrective action, sets priorities, targets specific fire programs, serves as a model for State and local analyses of fire data, and provides a baseline for evaluating programs.

The FBI Arson data are critical for obtaining a count of those arsons considered to have been willfully or maliciously set. The FBI UCR Program has successfully collected and published arson data since 1979.

5. Minimizing Burden on Small Businesses

This information will have no significant impact on small businesses. The law enforcement community requested that the forms be collected on a monthly basis since police records are run on a calendar month, however, the FBI minimizes burden on small law enforcement agencies by allowing them to submit quarterly, twice a year, or once a year. Although monthly is recommended, upon approval by the FBI UCR Program, agencies can submit data at intervals that minimizes the burdens to the agency.

6. Consequences of Not Conducting or Less Frequent Collection

In order to serve as the national repository for crime reporting and to produce a reliable dataset, the FBI collects monthly statistics that are reported by participating FBI UCR Program contributors. There is an ever-increasing need for timely and accurate data dissemination by the FBI to assist our partners in law enforcement.

Although monthly reports are preferred, the FBI UCR Program has agencies submitting data quarterly, twice a year, and even once a year. Upon approval by the FBI UCR Program agencies can submit data at intervals that minimizes the burdens to the agency.

Law enforcement agencies use UCR data to track crime, task force placement, staffing levels, and officer placement. The UCR data is used for administration, operation, management, and to determine effectiveness of task forces. Agencies will justify staffing levels and officer counts compared to other law enforcement agencies in order to receive additional staffing levels or equipment. Some agencies use other agencies’ crime statistics and staffing levels to justify their own crime statistics and staffing levels in order to obtain funding.

In past years, a committee was formed to examine less frequent reporting, below are the results. This committee was chaired by Dr. Peter P. Lejins, Department of Sociology, University of Maryland; Dr. Charlton F. Chute, Director, Institute of Public Administration, New York City; and Mr. Stanley R. Schrotel, Chief of Police, Cincinnati, Ohio.

Frequency of Reports from Cooperating Police Departments

The committee has very seriously considered the possibility of diminishing the frequency of submission of the statistical reports by the cooperating police departments. This would mean abandoning the present scheme of getting monthly reports and substituting perhaps a quarterly or semiannual report from the police instead. The Committee has, however, rejected the idea of any change in this direction, in spite of the fact that it appears reasonable to assume that a report submitted quarterly, for instance, would decrease the amount of work to be done by the local police departments as compared to a monthly report. This could then perhaps be, used as an argument for requesting an increased amount of information in the less frequent reports. There is the danger that with the pressure for monthly reports removed, the police departments might become somewhat less punctilious and instead of producing more data for the three-months report, might actually become less precise and, not having gotten up a report for a longer period, could conceivably have difficulty in getting data together for the three-months report. Besides, of course, all analyses which are based on monthly reports, for instance the fluctuation of crime frequency in the course of the year, might suffer considerably. After studying this matter, the Committee decided not to recommend any change in the current practice.

7. Special Circumstances

All data are collected/received from the FBI UCR Program participants on a monthly basis. The FBI’s UCR Program has established various time frames and deadlines for acquiring the monthly data. Monthly reports/submissions should be received at the FBI by the seventh day after the close of each month. Annual deadlines are also designated in order to collect/assess receipt of monthly submissions. There are times when special circumstances may cause an agency to request an extension. The FBI’s UCR Program has the authority to grant these extensions. Participation in the national UCR Program is voluntary.

8. Public Comments and Consultations

The 60 and 30 day notices have been submitted and published in the Federal Register with no public comments received.

9. Provision of Payments or Gifts to Respondents

The FBI's UCR Program does not provide any payment or gift to respondents.

10. Assurance of Confidentiality

This information collection does not contain personally identifiable information that may reveal the identity of an individual. The data is obtained from public agencies and are, therefore, in the public domain. The FBI UCR Program does not assure confidentiality.

11. Justification for Sensitive Questions

The information collection does not seek information of a sensitive nature.

12. Estimate of Respondent's Burden

The estimated hour burden on the respondent for this data collection is as follows:

Number of respondents 18,233

Frequency of responses 12/year

Total annual responses 218,796

Minutes per response 9 minutes

Annual hour burden 20,866 hours

Total number of Summary Reporting System agencies 11,592

Total number of NIBRS agencies 6,641

Total number of potential agencies 11,592 + 6,641 = 18,233

Burden hours for NIBRS agencies = 0

(The NIBRS burden hours are captured in the NIBRS Information Collection Request.)

Burden hours for all other agencies 11,592 x 12 = 139,104 x 9 / 60 = 20,866 burden hours

13. Estimate of Cost Burden

There are no direct costs to law enforcement to participate in the FBI UCR Program other than their time to respond. With the renewal of this form respondents are not expected to incur any capital, start-up, or system maintenance costs associated with this information collection. Costs to agency Records Management System (RMS) are very difficult to obtain. Vendors do not divulge costs due to the fact that vendors charge differently from agency to agency. Many costs are built into the vendors contracts. Depending on the vendor contracts, changes mandated by law are included within the original contract with no other additional costs. However, an estimate has been projected that agencies pay an $18,000 maintenance fee every year for system maintenance costs.

14. Cost to Federal Government

According to the cost object provided by FBI Criminal Justice Information Services (CJIS), Resource Management Section, Financial Management Unit the following are generalized projections based upon prior collection activity as well as activities anticipated over the next three years for the FBI UCR Program.

Staff Costs for Data Collection and Processing

CSMU Correspondence/Documents $458,966

Data Requests $162,592

Data Collection/Analysis $1,771,397

Publications/Reports $307,368

Total Cost to Federal Government $2,700,323

15. Reason for Change in Burden

There is no increase in burden on the individual respondents; however, the overall annual burden hours have decreased. This is an adjustment; a decrease from 32,594 to 20,866 which is a decrease of 11,728 and is attributable to the capturing of NIBRS burden hours into its own information collection request.

16. Anticipated Publication Plan and Schedule

Published data are derived from data submissions furnished to the FBI from local, county, state, tribal, and federal law enforcement agencies throughout the country. National, regional, and state data are published in the annual edition of CIUS.

Initial request for police employee data October

Follow-up letter requesting police employee data December, following deadline

Deadline to submit data Late December

Data Processing/Analysis November-February

Publication of data September, of following year/CIUS

17. Display of Expiration Date

All information collected under this clearance will display the OMB Clearance Number and Expiration Date.

18. Exception to the Certification Statement

The FBI’s CJIS Division does not request an exception to the certification of this information collection.